: Jules Mountain
: Arctic Insanity
: Eye Press
: 9781785633959
: 1
: CHF 9.70
:
: Biographien, Autobiographien
: English
: 228
: Wasserzeichen
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
'A swashbuckling, page-turning, rip-roaring ride across the roof of the world' Adrian Bleese, author of Above the Law When a friend told Jules Mountain he'd bought a helicopter in Canada and would need to ship it home to the Channel Islands by container, Jules thought that sounded crazy. Why not just fly it? Actually there were lots of good reasons. The lightweight aircraft had a range of 300 miles, was neither pressurised nor supplied with oxygen, and could fly for just three hours before running out of fuel. Whereas the shortest feasible route was 4,300 miles across the polar ice cap, with stretches across water that would take up to five hours to cross. It sounded impossible for even the most experienced pilot, and Mountain had only been flying helicopters for three years. But he'd never been one to duck a challenge...so he volunteered for the job. Arctic Insanity is the hair-raising story of what happened next, as the madcap adventurer battled extreme cold, zero-visibility whiteouts and near-misses with icebergs - landing along the way in some of the harshest places on earth - in his bid to get the aircraft (and himself) back to Europe in one piece.

Jules Mountain is a maverick entrepreneur. In 2007 he was diagnosed with cancer while he was trying to sell his latest business. In spite of major surgery and chemotherapy he successfully sold the business just before the global financial crash. After a gruelling 12 months he recovered and set himself the new challenge of climbing Everest. He wanted to prove to himself that the cancer had in no way affected him and he was still as physically capable as he was before his diagnosis. He now advises other businesses and is a motivational speaker, as well as a loving father to his two daughters. Read more about Jules at www.julesmountain.co.uk.

1

A Crazy Plan

Just before Christmas in 2019 a friend phoned me at my house in Guernsey to say that he was buying a Bell 505X single-engine helicopter, which was being built in Canada.

He explained that potential buyers visit the Bell factory in Quebec, Canada, and take a flight in the helicopter. If they decide to buy the machine, it’s dismantled, placed in a shipping container, loaded onto a ship and transported across the Atlantic. When it arrives in the UK, it’s re-assembled and flight-tested again. Only then do you have your shiny new aircraft.

‘But it’s all phenomenally expensive,’ he said.

A crazy thought hit me. ‘How about we cut out the middleman?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I’ll fly it back for you.’

He let out a guffaw. ‘You’re joking, aren’t you?’

‘I’m serious.’

‘Jules, don’t be stupid. You can’t fly a helicopter from Canada to the UK.’

‘Why not?’

I believe that if you stay in your comfort zone your whole life, you waste your potential.

‘It’s too far. That’s why.’

‘But it must be possible.’

‘Has anyone ever attempted it before?’


‘No idea.’

Better to die trying than never to have tried at all, I thought to myself. I would rather live a very full life and hope I make it to old age than sit in my wheelchair dribbling into my tea dreaming about all the things I wish I’d done.

‘I doubt it. I mean, helicopters like the 505X aren’t designed to fly those sorts of distances.’

‘Yeah, but I’d make some stops.’

‘But you’d have to fly very high over a frozen landscape. It’s treacherous. It’s not like flying across the Home Counties.’

‘I get that.’

‘Do you? You’d be flying across some of the remotest areas on the planet.’

‘That’s part of the challenge.’ I wanted to test myself as a pilot and see how good I really was. ‘Come on, then, will you let me do it?’

The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea. The trip would be an opportunity to raise some more money for the charity I support, the haematology cancer care unit at University College, London. Several years earlier, I’d been diagnosed with cancer just as I was about to sell my second management consultancy, and had to have a tumour removed from my head. I almost died. So the charity is very close to my heart.

‘You really want to do this, don’t you?’

‘It would be fun.’

‘You know, anything could go wrong. You’d need to do your homework well.’

‘Don’t worry, mate, I will.’

I’m not a novice when it comes to adventure. I had actually been to the Arctic before, on a ski-touring and dog-sledging expedition, when we took a commercial flight to Iceland and then continued on a smaller plane to Kulusuk, on the eastern coast of Greenland. I had also climbed Everest. That involved a massive logistical challenge. I’ve always considered myself good at meticulous planning: it all comes down to knowledge, resourcefulness and adaptability. That expedition pushed me to the limit, which was precisely what I wanted when I chose to undertake it. Mind you, no amount of planning, or equipment, can guarantee you will be safe. Weather is unpredictable. I nearly got killed in an avalanche triggered by an earthquake in Nepal.

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